Farmer Focus: Fog lifts on new solar panels and cosy cabin
Tom Hildreth © Tim Scrivener A small incident involving a spaniel jumping off the sofa, across the coffee table and knocking a glass of water all over the laptop is not a great way to start the year.
Even more annoying when there is an article deadline looming…
See also: Farmer Focus: Dry spell forces us to feed winter ration
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December saw the maize fermentation stabilise. The herd typically seems to settle at peak yield for the winter at this time.
The cows are yielding 37 litres, which is less than last year, but with more than 0.5% extra combined solids, at 8.2%
Just three cows are dry now, which makes for a quiet time as far as calving goes.
All the heifer calves are weaned off and are growing at more than 800g a day, so they are well on track to be 380kg at 13-14 months old, ready for serving.
Ad-lib straw and 3kg of 18% cake see the younger heifers achieve that target. And 15kg of silage a day is fed when they come in after their first grazing.
I think I mentioned we had vaccinated the youngstock for pneumonia. Touch wood, I haven’t had to jab them, even with the early December fog that didn’t lift properly for close on a week.
However, the fog did cause us other problems in the way of slippery shed roofs. The chaps installing our 70kW solar panel system couldn’t get onto them for fear of slipping over.
Three days’ power washing solved that problem, and we were running on solar within a week – during the day, anyway.
The last main investment for the foreseeable future on the ice cream business arrived as timber on a pallet at the beginning of December.
Within 11 days it was a log cabin and had replaced the picnic benches under a lean-to.
It provides a seating area complete with lighting, heating, tables, chairs and even a couple of old sofas, and has been a hit with our customers.
The log cabin should help keep trade up as we head into the first couple of months of the year.